{"id":10057,"date":"2014-06-03T05:00:35","date_gmt":"2014-06-03T12:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/?p=10057"},"modified":"2014-06-03T00:19:48","modified_gmt":"2014-06-03T07:19:48","slug":"type-a-summer-vacay-or-how-im-not-effortless","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/?p=10057","title":{"rendered":"Type A Summer Vacay or How I’m Not Effortless"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"summer-vacation\"<\/a><\/p>\n

There are thirteen more days of school left for K, and the ginormous maw of summer has been inching toward me, begging me to feed it with worthy activities.<\/p>\n

I started a little late on the summer camp sign-up process this year, and here in Seattle, it’s like a competitive sport to get access to the various “enrichment” programs. Most of the popular ones are filled by early April, and you have to be aggressively Type A to have your ducks in a row so that you’re not stuck with the most expensive or least appealing camps (e.g. “Nooooooo, not Math camp, Mommy!!”). In actuality, I’m a step down from the traditional Type A personality — more of a Type A minus — so I’m missing a few ducks at this juncture.<\/p>\n

At first I thought that I would be uncharacteristically mellow and just let summer unfold organically with no structure or scheduled activities. But that’s not me. I’m just not the loosey goosey sort, as much as I’d love to be. I remember how — as part of a college graduation present — I went to Europe with two of my friends, and I beleaguered them with my incessant need to have a specific itinerary every step of the way. Maybe this makes me unfun and unspontaneous, but despite a few blunders, my OCD travel agent skills often saved the day throughout our month-long summer excursion.<\/p>\n

\"europe-todo\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I’ve always been told I look busy, even when I’m not doing anything. This came in handy when I had a corporate job in which I actually had days when I had nothing to do. People assumed from my…what? knitted brows? intense gaze at the computer? that I was frenetically working on something<\/em> at all times.<\/p>\n

And that might be true. My mind churns ceaselessly: imagining, worrying, planning, remembering, designing…in short, I never look relaxed or effortless.<\/p>\n

I’ve been thinking about how so much of the internet makes everything seem so effortless. Things like: Oh, I just decoupaged this twenty-foot tall wardrobe with my hand-printed wallpaper in a couple of hours.\u00a0<\/em>Or: Do you like my lustrous, frizz-less hair and casually tossed-on outfit that looks like a spread from Elle Magazine? I woke up like this.<\/em>\u00a0It’s not just that everything looks<\/em> perfect, but the subtext is that it’s also easy<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I know I’ve mentioned similar thoughts before, but I’ve been wondering if this emphasis on easy peasy perfection is especially problematic for the younger generation, namely my own child. She looks at me as though I’m a fascinating alien when I mention researching for reports in libraries when I was little; at the age of almost 8, she knows full well how to Google. Don’t get me wrong — I love technology and all it can do when done right. But in this instant gratification society we live in, effortful is uncool, undesirable. Expectations of creating your own start-up and becoming a trillionaire before you’re 21 seem to be on the rise these days. While partying it up. I’ve read how “millenials” are getting a lot of flak for the seemingly entitled mentality they’ve formed, but what of the even younger generation? I can’t remember where I heard\/read it, but when children were recently surveyed with the question, “what do you want to be when you grow up?”, a startling number said, “Famous.” Maybe it’s not directly correlated to effortlessness, but I find this disconcerting.<\/p>\n

I guess it’s not a new concept, this whole don’t-let-them-see-you-sweat notion \u00a0— who wants to be associated with the image of a schvitzing, grunting, unglamorous worker bee? Or worker pig might be a more appropriate visual, no offense to the porky. I’m definitely a worker sow, I think.<\/p>\n

\"worker-sow\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Anyway. I have more thought on this, but I’m roaming around all over the place with this post, and it’s time to focus my Type A minus personality and finish scheduling our summer to death.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There are thirteen more days of school left for K, and the ginormous maw of summer has been inching toward me, begging me to feed it with worthy activities. I started a little late on the summer camp sign-up process this year, and here in Seattle, it’s like a competitive sport to get access to the various “enrichment” programs. Most of the popular ones are filled by early April, and you have to be aggressively Type A to have your ducks in a row so that you’re not stuck with the most expensive or least appealing camps (e.g. “Nooooooo, not Math camp, Mommy!!”). In actuality, I’m a step down from the traditional Type A personality — more of a Type A minus — so I’m missing a few ducks at this juncture. At first I thought that I would be uncharacteristically mellow and just let summer unfold organically with no structure or scheduled activities. But that’s not me. I’m just not the loosey goosey sort, as much as I’d love to be. I remember how — as part of a college graduation present — I went to Europe with two of my friends, and I beleaguered them with my incessant need to have a specific itinerary every step of the way. Maybe this makes me unfun and unspontaneous, but despite a few blunders, my OCD travel agent skills often saved the day throughout our month-long summer excursion. I’ve always been told I look busy, even when I’m not doing anything. This came in handy when I had a corporate job in which I actually had days when I had nothing to do. People assumed from my…what? knitted brows? intense gaze at the computer? that I was frenetically working on something at all times. And that might be true. My mind churns ceaselessly: imagining, worrying, planning, remembering, designing…in short, I never look relaxed or effortless. I’ve been thinking about how so much of the internet makes everything seem so effortless. Things like: Oh, I just decoupaged this twenty-foot tall wardrobe with my hand-printed wallpaper in a couple of hours.\u00a0Or: Do you like my lustrous, frizz-less hair and casually tossed-on outfit that looks like a spread from Elle Magazine? I woke up like this.\u00a0It’s not just that everything looks perfect, but the subtext is that it’s also easy. I know I’ve mentioned similar thoughts before, but I’ve been wondering if this emphasis on easy peasy perfection is especially problematic for the younger generation, namely my own child. She looks at me as though I’m a fascinating alien when I mention researching for reports in libraries when I was little; at the age of almost 8, she knows full well how to Google. Don’t get me wrong — I love technology and all it can do when done right. But in this instant gratification society we live in, effortful is uncool, undesirable. Expectations of creating your own start-up and becoming a trillionaire before you’re 21 seem to be on the rise these days. While partying it up. I’ve read how “millenials” are getting a lot of flak for the seemingly entitled mentality they’ve formed, but what of the even younger generation? I can’t remember where I heard\/read it, but when children were recently surveyed with the question, “what do you want to be when you grow up?”, a startling number said, “Famous.” Maybe it’s not directly correlated to effortlessness, but I find this disconcerting. I guess it’s not a new concept, this whole don’t-let-them-see-you-sweat notion \u00a0— who wants to be associated with the image of a schvitzing, grunting, unglamorous worker bee? Or worker pig might be a more appropriate visual, no offense to the porky. I’m definitely a worker sow, I think. Anyway. I have more thought on this, but I’m roaming around all over the place with this post, and it’s time to focus my Type A minus personality and finish scheduling our summer to death.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8,12,9,33],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-10057","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-gouache","7":"category-illustration","8":"category-life","9":"category-writing","10":"entry","11":"has-post-thumbnail"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10057"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10057\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10087,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10057\/revisions\/10087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}